Calls
for boycotting Israel remained the main theme of the protest, a trend that has
been promoted by pro-Palestinian activists for years as part of the Boycott,
Divestment and Sanctions movement, or BDS.

The
demonstrators also held banners that condemned Israel’s "criminal siege and
occupation” of Palestinian lands and stated that "Judaism rejects the Zionist
state.”

The rally began outside of the BBC
headquarters and ended at the US Embassy in central London, according to Press
TV’s correspondent Roshan Muhammed Salih.

Co-organized
by the Islamic Human Rights Council, the event also featured Jewish speakers
who drew a line between being anti-Israeli occupation and anti-Semitism, an
accusation that pro-Israeli lobbies often use to stifle protests.

Anti-Israeli
sentiments have risen among people across the world — including in the UK —
over Tel Aviv’s discriminatory policies in the occupied territories and toward
the Gaza Strip.

The occupied Palestinian territories have
seen tensions ever since Israel introduced restrictions on the entry of
Palestinian worshipers into the al-Aqsa Mosque compound in East Jerusalem
al-Quds in August 2015.

More
than 300 Palestinians have lost their lives at the hands of Israeli forces
since the beginning of October 2015.

In
the UK, students in many universities have been leading various campaigns in
solidarity with Palestinians despite a widespread crackdown by university
officials.

The trend reached its peak when a group of
students in the University of Manchester went on a hunger strike in solidarity
with more than 1,500 Palestinian prisoners who had been refusing food for days
to raise awareness about the abuses they were being subjected to in Israeli
jails.

The
last Friday of the month of Ramadan has been designated by the late Imam
Khomeini as the International Quds Day.